The 21-year-old from Zurich Oberland is a cross-country skier in winter and a triathlete in summer. On Wednesday she dropped out of the Tour de Ski. But that was the plan.
Anja Weber will make her Olympic debut in Beijing in 2022 – but the Summer Games are also attractive.
Anja Weber is a phenomenon: in her age group, the Zurich Oberland native is one of the best in cross-country skiing and triathlon – worldwide. And she also draws attention to herself in the elite, most recently at the Tour de Ski. Best intermediate time, best time at the finish, Anja Weber on the leader’s chair. This is what happened in the third stage on Tuesday, a single start race over 10 kilometers in Oberstdorf.
In the end it was nothing more than a snapshot, Weber fell back to 22nd place. But the overall impression left by the Tour de Ski is positive. On Wednesday, too, she finished 22nd in the pursuit race over 20 kilometers and improved by seven positions in the tour rankings to rank 26. After that she left Oberstdorf and the Tour de Ski. As planned, Anja Weber will no longer compete in the last three stages in Val di Fiemme to protect herself and in view of the U-23 World Championships in Whistler.
At the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing, the 21-year-old from Hinwil gained experience at the top level early on. She names the 2026 (winter) and 2028 (summer) games as long-term goals.
Anja Weber before the Olympic Games in Beijing.
The experts advised against duplication
The path taken by Anja Weber led to headlines and dissonance years ago. “This duplication is not possible at the highest level,” she heard from experts. The individual associations vied for her and a decision for her sport. Anja Weber and her environment did not heed the call for specialization. The voices have now largely fallen silent. Now the question arises: How does Anja Weber manage to master this double burden?
Anja Weber was born into a sports-loving family as the third child. In their free time, there were numerous activities on the programme: hiking, bike trips, active holidays with a camper. The youngest emulated her older siblings. And in one area she excelled very early on, as her mother Barbara remembers: “Anja climbed the rocks barefoot like a weasel.”
In everyday life, Anja and her mother accompanied her siblings to training. And soon got the taste to compete with others. At the age of three she took part in the Kyburg run with the “Zwergli”, at the age of seven she completed the Ironkids triathlon in Rapperswil-Jona as “Fischli”. She began gymnastics, joined the Uster Wallisellen swimming club at the age of seven and the SC am Bachtel at the age of nine. There she found cross-country skiing.
Biathlon was too much of a good thing
Unsurprisingly, she also discovered biathlon. But all the endurance sports overwhelmed even her – in terms of time. The shooting training in particular required too much attention. With a heavy heart she gave up biathlon after a few (successful) years.
Even without biathlon, the coordination between swimming, running, cycling (triathlon) and cross-country skiing proved to be challenging in terms of time and training control. When she joined Michi Rüegg, the trainer of her (triathlon) sister Jasmin, joined the TG Hütten and Rüegg took on the overall planning, a construct was found that Weber still builds on today.
The association offers a home, Rüegg coordinates and sets the framework. The specialist trainers – today Ivan Hudac in cross-country skiing and Gerard Moerland in swimming – take care of the detailed planning and design the individual units. Rüegg is also national running coach at Swiss Athletics and coach of the marathon and steeple figureheads Fabienne Schlumpf and Chiara Scherrer. Anja Weber primarily benefits from them in the exchange and learns from their experiences in sport and in the environment.
There are special challenges for Rüegg. “Instead of build-up phases in the respective sports, Anja contests the competition season in the other.” To ensure that the changeover is successful, Rüegg ensures that the season ends early. A week of regeneration is announced before the build-up begins in the other division. And especially in winter there is a bit of summer left: Anja Weber usually swims twice a week – instead of regeneration units.
Weber’s extraordinary path takes its toll. Her trainer Michi Rüegg says: “Anja cannot call up her full potential at the beginning of the season. She needs more time.” In cross-country skiing, peak form is awaited until February. The plan worked out last year. This year there is nothing to suggest that things could turn out differently. And: Two seasons of competition would also have others, Rüegg points out. The track and field athletes, for example, with the indoor and outdoor season. But at Weber it’s not one and the same sport.
Baking and cooking as a balance to everyday sports
Sport takes up a lot of space in Anja Weber’s life. She graduated from the United School of Sports with KV and vocational diploma, today she works as a commercial employee with a 20 percent workload in her training company. And she loves to bake and cook. This is an important balance for them. The 2022 to the «SRF 3 Best Talent Sports» chosen Anja Weber as a well-positioned, communicative, pleasant person. Rüegg, for example, says: “Anja laughs a lot and creates a good atmosphere.”
In addition to the professional training environment, Weber relies heavily on family ties: on the emotional mother and the analytical father, sister, brother. The relationship with Sister Jasmin is particularly close – “and has been for years”. There are hardly any conflicts, the two of them don’t know envy either, mutual support dominates. And this despite the fact that the basic competitive pattern is evident in both personalities and the trial of strength has shifted in many areas in favor of the younger generation.
This was particularly evident last summer when Anja Weber returned after a missed triathlon season in 2021 (four months break due to heart muscle inflammation) and set an exclamation mark with the European Cup podium in Hungary. This is where what father Felix emphasizes came into play: «Anja thinks extremely positively and above all: never negatively. She doesn’t look back, she always looks ahead.”